2 ms·

We aren't even using 0.000000001% of the atoms in the Earth's crust, and the Universe is a lot larger than just the Earth.

ben_w 1y ago
Most of the atoms in our crust are, in order, oxygen (46.1%), silicon (28.2%), aluminium (8.23%), and iron (5.63%). Getting at the metal would leave a dangerous excess of oxygen. Lots of important industrial elements are in the parts per thousand to parts per million range: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abundance_of_elements_in_Earth%27s_crust https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abundance_of_elements_in_Earth... The majority of the universe is hydrogen and helium; most of what we see is now inaccessible due to the expansion of the universe and the speed of light; and even the stuff we can reach, because of the speed of light, requires a slow down to cubic growth at best (closer than galactic disk thickness or further than galactic isotropy); and even then that's for the species as a whole, as the speed of light eventually stops and single thing from growing at all. Exponential growth has a way of reaching big numbers quickly. Now sure, it's still a while for the stuff we can access — I don't know if your percentage is correct, but looks about right, and at 2% annual growth (so: no VN replication ever) that's 1163 years for the crust, then another 233 for the rest of the planet — but that assumes we can use the whole thing and aren't reliant on some trace elements, e.g. carbon (which is 200ppm) or tin (2.3ppm) or selenium (0.05ppm of the crust, and if Wikipedia is right about five times higher, 0.25ppm, in a human body).
atoav 1y ago
Yeah, but infinite is kinda a big number. And the universe has less than 0.0000000001% useful stuff in it and the rest kills us. My argument wasn't about how long it takes to deplete our resources, my argument was that eventually they will be deleted. And we are in a small emergeny raft on a wide ocean. Right now everybody is eating as if we are on vaction. We are not.

ben_w 1y ago

Most of the atoms in our crust are, in order, oxygen (46.1%), silicon (28.2%), aluminium (8.23%), and iron (5.63%). Getting at the metal would leave a dangerous excess of oxygen. Lots of important industrial elements are in the parts per thousand to parts per million range: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abundance_of_elements_in_Earth%27s_crust https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abundance_of_elements_in_Earth... The majority of the universe is hydrogen and helium; most of what we see is now inaccessible due to the expansion of the universe and the speed of light; and even the stuff we can reach, because of the speed of light, requires a slow down to cubic growth at best (closer than galactic disk thickness or further than galactic isotropy); and even then that's for the species as a whole, as the speed of light eventually stops and single thing from growing at all. Exponential growth has a way of reaching big numbers quickly. Now sure, it's still a while for the stuff we can access — I don't know if your percentage is correct, but looks about right, and at 2% annual growth (so: no VN replication ever) that's 1163 years for the crust, then another 233 for the rest of the planet — but that assumes we can use the whole thing and aren't reliant on some trace elements, e.g. carbon (which is 200ppm) or tin (2.3ppm) or selenium (0.05ppm of the crust, and if Wikipedia is right about five times higher, 0.25ppm, in a human body).

atoav 1y ago

Yeah, but infinite is kinda a big number. And the universe has less than 0.0000000001% useful stuff in it and the rest kills us. My argument wasn't about how long it takes to deplete our resources, my argument was that eventually they will be deleted. And we are in a small emergeny raft on a wide ocean. Right now everybody is eating as if we are on vaction. We are not.